The large branch of the Po we crossed, came down from the mountains, which we were approaching. As we reached the post-road again, they were glowing in the last rays of the sun, and the evening vapors that settled over the plain concealed the distant Alps, although the snowy top of the Jungfrau and her companions the Wetterhorn and Schreckhorn, rose above it like the hills of another world. A castle or church of brilliant white marble glittered on the summit of one of the mountains near us, and as the sun went down without a cloud, the distant summits changed in hue to a glowing purple, amounting almost to crimson, which afterwards darkened into a deep violet. The western half of the sky was of a pale orange, and the eastern a dark red, which blended together in the blue of the zenith, that deepened as twilight came on. I know not if it was a fair specimen of an Italian sunset, but I must say, without wishing to be partial, that though certainly very soft and beautiful, there is no comparison with the splendor of such a scene in America. The day-sky of Italy better deserves its reputation. Although no clearer than our own, it is of a far brighter blue, arching above us like a dome of sapphire and seeming to sparkle all over with a kind of crystal transparency.
We stopped the second night at Arquato, a little village among the mountains, and after having bargained with the merry landlord for our lodgings, in broken Italian, took a last look at the plains of Piedmont and the Swiss Alps, in the growing twilight. We gazed out on the darkening scene till the sky was studded with stars, and went to rest with the exciting thought of seeing Genoa and the Mediterranean on the morrow. Next morning we started early, and after walking some distance made our breakfast in a grove of chesnuts, on the cool mountain side, beside a fresh stream of water. The sky shone like a polished gem, and the glossy leaves of the chesnuts gleamed in the morning sun. Here and there, on a rocky height, stood the remains of some knightly castle, telling of the Goths and Normans who descended through these mountain passes to plunder Rome.
As the sun grew high, the heat and dust became intolerable, and this, in connection with the attention we raised everywhere, made us somewhat tired of foot-traveling in Italy. I verily believe the people took us for pilgrims on account of our long white blouses, and had I a scallop shell I would certainly have stuck it into my hat to complete the appearance. We stopped once to ask a priest the road; when he had told us, he shook hands with us and gave us a parting benediction. At the common inns, where we stopped, we always met with civil treatment, though, indeed, as we only slept in them, there was little chance of practising imposition. We bought our simple meals at the baker's and grocer's, and ate them in the shade of the grape-bowers, whose rich clusters added to the repast. In this manner, we enjoyed Italy at the expense of a franc, daily. About noon, after winding about through the narrow defiles, the road began ascending. The reflected heat from the hills on each side made it like an oven; there was not a breath of air stirring; but we all felt, although no one said it, that from the summit we could see the Mediterranean, and we pushed on as if life or death depended on it. Finally, the highest point came in sight—we redoubled our exertions, and a few minutes more brought us to the top, breathless with fatigue and expectation. I glanced down the other side—there lay a real sea of mountains, all around; the farthest peaks rose up afar and dim, crowned with white towers, and between two of them which stood apart like the pillars of a gateway, we saw the broad expanse of water stretching away to the horizon—
To where the blue of heaven on bluer waves shut down!"
It would have been a thrilling sight to see any ocean, when one has rambled thousands of miles among the mountains and vales of the inland, but to behold this sea, of all others, was glorious indeed! This sea, whose waves wash the feet of Naples, Constantinople and Alexandria, and break on the hoary shores where Troy and Tyre and Carthage have mouldered away!—whose breast has been furrowed by the keels of a hundred nations through more than forty centuries—from the first rude voyage of Jason and his Argonauts, to the thunders of Navarino that heralded the second birth of Greece! You cannot wonder we grew romantic; but short space was left for sentiment in the burning sun, with Genoa to be reached before night. The mountain we crossed is called the Bochetta, one of the loftiest of the sea-Alps (or Apennines)—the road winds steeply down towards the sea, following a broad mountain rivulet, now perfectly dried up, as nearly every stream among the mountains is. It was a long way to us; the mountains seemed as if they would never unfold and let us out on the shore, and our weary limbs did penance enough for a multitude of sins. The dusk was beginning to deepen over the bay and the purple hues of sunset were dying away from its amphitheatre of hills, as we came in sight of the gorgeous city. Half the population were out to celebrate a festival, and we made our entry in the triumphal procession of some saint.
CHAPTER XXXIII. — SCENES IN GENOA, LEGHORN AND PISA.
Have you ever seen some grand painting of a city, rising with its domes and towers and palaces from the edge of a glorious bay, shut in by mountains—the whole scene clad in those deep, delicious, sunny hues which you admire so much in the picture, although they appear unrealized in Nature? If so, you can figure to yourself Genoa, as she looked to us at sunset, from the battlements west of the city. When we had passed through the gloomy gate of the fortress that guards the western promontory, the whole scene opened at once on us in all its majesty. It looked to me less like a real landscape than a mighty panoramic painting. The battlements where we were standing, and the blue mirror of the Mediterranean just below, with a few vessels moored near the shore, made up the foreground; just in front lay the queenly city, stretching out to the eastern point of the bay, like a great meteor—-this point, crowned with the towers and dome of a cathedral representing the nucleus, while the tail gradually widened out and was lost among the numberless villas that reached to the top of the mountains behind. A mole runs nearly across the mouth of the harbor, with a tall light-house at its extremity, leaving only a narrow passage for vessels. As we gazed, a purple glow lay on the bosom of the sea, while far beyond the city, the eastern half of the mountain crescent around the gulf was tinted with the loveliest hue of orange. The impressions which one derives from looking on remarkable scenery, depend, for much of their effect, on the time and weather. I have been very fortunate in this respect in two instances, and shall carry with me through life, two glorious pictures of a very different character—the wild sublimity of the Brocken in cloud and storm, and the splendor of Genoa in an Italian sunset.
Genoa has been called the "city of palaces." and it well deserves the appellation. Row above row of magnificent structures rise amid gardens along the side of the hills, and many of the streets, though narrow and crooked, are lined entirely with the splendid dwellings of the Genoese nobles. All these speak of the republic in its days of wealth and power, when it could cope successfully with Venice, and Doria could threaten to bridle the horses of St. Mark. At present its condition is far different; although not so fallen as its rival, it is but a shadow of its former self—the life and energy it possessed as a republic, has withered away under the grasp of tyranny.